From the point at which we have arrived, it may he profitable to look back a little, ere we proceed. Man's heart, as we have seen, has been fully reached, its secret springs laid bare. The mist, with which a false religiousness surrounds it, is here rolled back by the Master's hand, and all is thoroughly exposed. " The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked: who can know it? I the Lord search the heart. I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways." (Jer. 17:9, 109The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? 10I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings. (Jeremiah 17:9‑10).) If, therefore, the question is asked, " Where is the heart?" The answer is, " Far from God." And, if it be asked, " What is the heart? " The answer is, " Deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked." Thus it is as to the heart of every unregenerate man, woman, and child, on the face of this earth. The character, the circumstances, the disposition may vary; but the heart is the same. It cannot be trusted, inasmuch, as it is deceitful above all things, and, whatever be the outward appearance, it is desperately wicked. It may not have developed itself fully. Its very deceitfulness is seen in the fact of its hiding its true condition. If a person does not know that his heart is desperately wicked, it is just because of its deep deceitfulness.
But, blessed be God, there is another heart for the sinner to look at, when he has learned the truth about his own, and that is, the heart of God, as revealed in Christ. What a mercy! Had I nothing to look at, but my own deceitful and desperately wicked heart, it would be gloomy indeed. But the only One who could thoroughly search my heart, has perfectly revealed His own. This is enough. The sinner's heart searched and God's heart revealed, are the two grand and all-important points. In the former, there is nothing but evil; in the latter, perfect love—love that flows out, notwithstanding all the evil—love that has glorified itself about the evil, by executing judgment thereupon, and working out a full deliverance from its power. Hence, when any one has been led, by the illuminating and convicting power of the Holy Ghost, to take a true view of his own heart, he is just in the position to delight in the unfoldings of the heart of God.
Let us now see how all this comes out in the touching and instructive story of the Syrophenician. " Then Jesus went thence, and departed into the coasts of Tire and Sidon. And, behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coasts, and cried unto him, saying, Have mercy on me, Ο Lord, thou Son of David! My daughter is grievously vexed with a devil." Here, then, is a different atmosphere altogether. Our blessed Lord turns His back upon all the religiousness of man—upon his ordinances, his traditions, his washings, his hypocrisy; and He betakes Himself to a region where there is no pretension at all—a region where real need and wretchedness are felt. This was the place for Christ. The poor woman of Canaan knew and cared little about the traditions of the elders. Of what use could they be to her? She felt the pressure of Satan's power. Could man's ordinances touch that? Surely not? None but Jesus for her. Others might occupy themselves in washing dishes and tables, but that could never do for her. She wanted something deeper, something more real than that. She wanted Christ, and to Him she made her way.
Would that thousands, in this our day, felt as the woman of Canaan. Truly it is a day of ordinances—a day of traditionary religion—a day in the which the commandments and doctrines of men bear sway. Fleshly pietism is putting on its ten thousand imposing forms, and exerting a potent influence over the legal and religious mind. But, with all this, the poor heart is not satisfied, the need is not met, the pressure is not removed. Oh! that thousands would only just come to Jesus, and find in Him all they want for time and eternity. "None but Jesus can do helpless sinners good."
But we have already remarked that in the passage of scripture now lying open before us, the heart of Jesus was hidden, so far as the Syrophenician was concerned, behind very high dispensational enclosures. A woman of Canaan had no claims on " The Son of David," and yet she addressed Him by that title. True, there was love in the heart of Jesus for any poor creature that came to Him in simple faith. But as " Son of David " he stood behind those lofty Jewish barriers which concealed Him from a Gentile's view. He was " a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers." (Rom. 15:88Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers: (Romans 15:8)) Not one jot or tittle of those promises could ever fail in the hands of such a faithful and august Minister; and, therefore, unless the Syrophenician could view Him in a higher character than as a minister of the circumcision, He must maintain a total silence. " He answered her not a word." The Son of David had no answer for a Canaanite. He must stand for the truth of God, and confirm the promises made unto the fathers. With these promises she had nothing whatever to do. He could not help a Canaanite at the expense of the seed of Abraham.
The disciples, wholly unable to fathom the deep mysteries which were then filling the mind and being told out in the ministry of their divine Master, "came and besought him, saying, Send her away." Alas! how little they knew Him! How could He ever send away a poor oppressed creature? What! the Son of God send away from His presence one who was suffering under the crushing, grinding hand of Satan! Impossible! Though, as "Son of David," He could not answer, yet, as " Son of God," He could not possibly dismiss her. If, as the Minister of the circumcision, He had no reply, certainly, as the Minister of the grace of God, He had no rebuff. Though, as the vindicator of the truth of God, He had to be silent, yet as the expression of divine love, He could not be severe. He had blessing for her, but she must take her proper place and view Him, not merely as Son of David, but as Lord of all. " I am not sent," said He, " but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel; " and she did not belong to the sheep of Israel, but to the race of Canaan.
But faith cannot be foiled. It knows there is a full blessing in the heart of Jesus, and it will have it. Thus it was with the Syrophenician. She had set out to reach the loving, tender heart of Christ, and she was not to be put off. The dispensational barriers might be lofty, but that made no difference. They might be immovable, but it was all the same. She felt that though He could not remove them, He could rise above them. Though the glories of the Son of David could only shine within Jewish boundaries, the glories of the Son of God could shed their brilliant luster over all the earth. All this she knew. Her faith could grasp it. She felt it was utterly impossible for that blessed One to dismiss a case of need from His presence. " Then came she, and worshipped him, saying, Lord help me."
Here, we reach the grand point in this intensely interesting narrative. The Syrophenician now places herself in the divine presence as one simply needing help, and no one ever did, or ever can do, this in vain. Oh! the depth, power, and fullness of these three words, " Lord, help me! " They form a chain with three links. We have " "Lord" at one end, "me" at the other, and "help" the link between. Nothing can be simpler. The moment faith forms this precious chain all is settled. The little word " help" may contain everything that the soul can possibly require here or hereafter.
Reader, let me pause here, and ask you, pointedly, have you ever really formed this precious chain with three links? Have you, by simple faith, put Jesus at one end, yourself at the other, and " help" between? If so, all is settled -divinely and eternally settled. You have put Him in His right place as the Supplier, and taken your right place as the supplied, and all you want is infallibly insured. The word " help" contains not only all you desire or need, but all that Christ is able and willing to give. Remember this. The very moment the sinner takes his true place before God, there is nothing but salvation for him. Nor is it merely such a salvation as suits him to get, but, better far, such an one as suits God to give. This is a great and marvelous fact, illustrating, most forcibly, the moral grandeur of the gospel of the grace of God. Let a sinner only take his true place, before God, as a sinner, and the whole matter is settled. God is his Savior and he is saved—saved according to the measure of the perfectness of the Person and work of Christ.
But we must be in our right place. And what is that? Lost! The moment this is seen, the question passes entirely out of our hands into the hands of God, and there it is settled in such a way as to illustrate, as nothing else ever could, the glory of God. God is glorified in being linked, by the word " help " to the poor, helpless, guilty sinner. Eternal praise be to His holy name! Who would not trust Him? Who would not accept salvation at His hand? Who would not look to Him for all needed help, when to minister that help not only glorifies His name, but also gratifies his heart? May the Holy Ghost unfold to our souls more and more of the living depths of those three words, " Lord, help me!" They do so put God in His proper place, as the Helper, and man in his proper place as the helped. There is no limit to the word " help; " it is as deep and boundless as the source from which it flows, and must therefore fully meet the most pressing exigencies of the sinner's case. The fountain of help is God Himself, and the streams thereof come gushing forth, in ten thousand channels, to answer the varied forms of human need. Is the conscience oppressed with the heavy burden of guilt? There is help for me in Jesus—the very help I need. His precious blood cleanseth from alt sin, and gives perfect ease to the conscience. Do I feel the burden of indwelling sin, and sigh for victory over the habits and tendencies of nature? I have only to cast myself upon Christ, in the spirit of these words, " Lord, help me." Thus it is in everything. Faith links the soul with Christ, and all His fullness becomes mine, to be used as occasion demands.
All this is strikingly unfolded in the narrative of the Syrophenician. Faith put her in her true place, and the moment she dropped into that place, Christ rose before the vision of her soul, in all the moral glory of His Person and the all-sufficiency of His grace. Her faith was of the right stamp. It stood the most severe testing. She showed herself prepared not only to give up all claim upon Jesus, as the Son of David, but to take her place as a dog under the table. " It is not meet," said Christ, " to take the children's bread, and cast it to dogs." This was putting faith into a most searching crucible. But, ah! my reader, it was really putting honor upon it. True faith can bear to be tried. A genuine wedge can stand the furnace. The Lord Jesus knew what He had to deal with, and He was only leading this woman to a stand-point from the which she could get a view of Him that would satisfy every longing of her soul. She had no claim on the " Son of David " she had no right to " the children's bread; " she was a dog of the Gentiles. Was she prepared for all this? Yes, she was. " Truth, Lord; yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their master's table."
Reader, this is divine. Surely this was a refreshing draft for the Master's thirsty spirit. It was something very different from the traditions of the elders, the "corban" of the ancients, the washings of the Pharisees. There was nothing for the heart of Jesus like the faith of a poor sinner who cared not what place she occupied provided it was near Him. She knew, full well, that even a dog under His table must be well cared for. True, she could not lay claim to any dispensational relationship. She would not touch a morsel of the children's bread; but was there not a crumb for a dog? Yes, blessed be God. It was impossible that Christ could refuse a crumb for a needy creature. Faith triumphed, and the treasury of heaven is flung open to a poor woman of Canaan, in these glowing words, " Ο woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt."
This, surely, is enough. Faith has here reached the heart of God. It has made its way to that wondrous point. In the first division of our subject we were led to contemplate the heart of man; here we contemplate the heart of God. What a contrast! The eye of God rests on the heart of man and discovers it to be a fountain of evil. Here the eye of faith rests on the heart of God and finds it to be the fountain of goodness—a fountain ever fresh, ever flowing—a fountain from whence the soul may drink to its full satisfaction. " Be it unto thee, even as thou wilt." Precious word! Faith is the key to heaven's treasury. The Syrophenician held and used that mysterious key, and got access thereby to luxuries richer far than even " the children's bread."
Nothing can be more lovely than to mark the way in which this highly favored woman reaches the heart of Christ, hidden, as it was, behind those enclosures within which " The Son of David"—" The Minister of the circumcision"—found His proper range. It is truly delightful to note how she seizes the great fact that there was something in Him which could not be circumscribed by any dispensational boundary. Her faith enabled her to soar into regions far beyond Judaism and all its belongings. She did not want to touch that system, for a moment; she only wanted to touch the heart of Christ—that large, that boundless heart which could not be confined by any system under the sun. As to herself, she was prepared to take any place, even the place of a dog beneath the Master's table. It mattered not, in the least, where she was, provided she was near Him. It would have been no gain to her to be set upon Jewish ground. The aspirations of her faith carried her far beyond the ministration of "The Minister of the circumcision." It was Himself she reached, and in Him she found all she wanted. She bowed to the testimony as to her proper place, in that emphatic word, " Truth;" but she opened the very flood-gates of the heart of Jesus, by her significant "yet." What treasures of grace might she not expect to flow in through the opening made by her " yet.''
How suggestive are those two little words! " Truth " is the utterance of a convicted conscience; "yet," the breathing of a converted heart. The former puts the sinner into his right place; the latter leaves room for God to come in, in all the riches of his saving grace. That abandons all claim, on the ground of personal merit; this bases all expectation on the ground of the sovereign grace and mercy of God. Nothing can be simpler. It is only just one of a thousand striking illustrations of the same grand truth which shines, like a sunbeam, on every page of inspiration, from Genesis to the Revelation, " Thou hast destroyed thyself; but in me is thy help."